For the cropping of leading or trailing end portions of rolled steel and other metal products, difficulties have been encountered heretofore. It will be understood, that whenever we refer to cropping here, we mean to refer to the cutting off of a leading portion and/or a trailing portion to remove defective parts of the rolled article, to cut the rolled article to size, to remove samples of the rolled article for analysis, or for any other reason.
One of the problems hereto encountered is the ability to effect cropping at leading and/or trailing ends selectively for rolled products of different diameters and the need to operate at high speeds so as not to impede the rolling process since the cropping apparatus is commonly provided along the rolling line. The rolled products may be wire, rod, bars and any of a variety of structural shapes or properties. Cropping units can be provided on any of the rolling lines for fabricating any of these products.
In the past it was found to be difficult to carry out cropping on the fly and even the removal of the cropped portions frequently posed a problem.